Business communication generally falls into a few overarching categories or purposes: informing, persuading, and recommending.

When your primary goal is to provide factual information, updates, or data, your purpose is to inform. Examples of information include announcing a policy change to your team, sharing quarterly financial results, or updating a project status.

When you need to sway opinions, change behaviors, or win support, your purpose is to persuade. Examples of persuasion include convincing stakeholders to invest in a new initiative, pitching a product to potential clients, or advocating for a specific course of action.

When you are proposing solutions or guiding decision-making, your purpose is to recommend. Recommendation examples include suggesting strategies to improve efficiency, recommending a particular vendor or supplier, or advising on the best approach for a project.

Avoid the one-size-fits-all approach to communication. Adapt your approach based on the audience and the situation. Whether you’re presenting data, inspiring a team, or making critical recommendations, wisely consider the context as you choose your communication strategy.

By tailoring your communication to a specific audience and purpose—inform, persuade, or recommend—you will effectively convey your message, build rapport, and achieve your professional objectives.

Inform

One of the most common business communication functions is providing data. Informative communication increases your audience's understanding of the topic. Hence, practice simplifying complex topics to gain the trust and credibility of your audience.

Reed Hastings, the co-founder and CEO of Netflix, exemplifies how strategic thinking and leveraging credible information can drive transformative business decisions. Recognizing the limitations of physical DVDs, Hastings anticipated the eventual transition to online streaming. He saw the opportunity to leverage the internet to provide an expansive library of content that customers could access anytime, anywhere.

To validate his strategic thinking, Hastings used informative reports to guide his strategic decisions. Whether predicting the impact of broadband internet on DVD rentals or understanding consumer preferences, he relied on credible information to make data-driven decisions. Hastings's strategy enabled Netflix to successfully pivot and become a dominant force in the streaming industry.

Information provides direct, clear, specific, balanced, and objective data. When informing, avoid words that can frame a topic in a slanted light. The framing effect, a cognitive bias that influences decision-making, is based more on how the information is worded than on the information itself.

Giving clear instructions and effectively delivering bad news are important information subsets.

Instruct

If you have ever assembled a piece of IKEA furniture, you’ve been the audience for instruction. Was it a pleasant experience? Frustrating? Maddening?

While information encompasses a broader range of content meant to inform without requiring immediate action, instruction provides specific guidance to achieve an intended outcome.

Use polite verb commands—imperative mood—for instructions, which should leave little room for interpretation.

When instructing, use language that focuses on the end user—your audience. Well-crafted, well-tested, user-friendly process documents like user manuals, how-to guides, tutorial videos, and employee handbooks can mean the difference between a fantastic user experience and a mediocre one. Invest significant time crafting your instruction to provide the best audience experience possible.

Deliver bad news

I’ve got good news and bad news; which do you want first? You may have heard that line, which has become a well-known delivery format in contexts from stand-up comedy to everyday conversations.

But in a business communication context, bad news is no joke. Management communication literature defines bad news as information that negatively affects the receiver—cognitively, emotionally, or behaviorally. Because of its negative effects, no one wants to be the bearer of bad news, especially because the human brain is hard-wired to prioritize bad news. When presented with both good and bad news, humans remember one piece of bad news in a sea of good news.

Delivering bad news is hence a delicate communication task that requires sensitivity and empathy. Whether informing employees about layoffs or conveying disappointing financial results, deliver bad news tactfully and professionally.

Although they should not apologize for bad news decisions, leaders still must communicate empathy for those affected. In the case of delivering bad news, passive voice is sometimes appropriate: “The decision was made” or “The plant will be closed.”

In the delivery phase, check timing, choose the right medium, be empathetic and respectful, be transparent, and disclose all necessary information. If you do, the receiver may be more likely to accept the bad news.

Persuade

Smartphones are everywhere. According to Statista Technology Researcher Federica Laricchia, sales of the devices topped 1.43 billion units in 2021, yielding $448 billion in revenues.

Visionary Apple founder and CEO Steve Jobs is generally credited with this world-changing invention. He was at the helm of Apple when the first iPhone launched in June 2007. What few people know is that Jobs resisted the idea of the iPhone for years and was never a fan of external, not-developed-by-Apple apps, a market worth $85.1 billion in 2021.

Whom do we thank for the devices we all carry in our pockets? Thank Jobs’s senior executives' persuasive skills. As Adam Grant writes in a 2021 Harvard Business Review article, “Almost every leader has studied the genius of Jobs, but surprisingly few have studied the genius of those who managed to influence him."

Persuasion is the art of convincing someone to see something as you do—in a way that makes them want to act. In business, persuasion advances ideas and gets work done.

The notion that “great ideas sell themselves” is wishful thinking. Even iPhone-level ideas need persuasive expression.

Persuasive business communication—sales pitches, project proposals, cover letters, job interviews, or motivational speeches—convinces an audience to take a particular course of action, buy a product, or support a particular idea or proposal.

Usually unsolicited, meaning the audience did not seek the information, persuasive messages are submitted to an audience that has not previously considered the author’s ideas. Therefore, persuasive communicators must emphasize the benefits to the audience, employing timeless persuasive techniques: pathos, ethos, and logos.

Pathos

Harvard Kennedy School researcher Jennifer S. Lerner and her research partners from UC Riverside and Claremont McKenna College demonstrate that although we all think we make rational decisions, most of us evaluate alternatives with our gut and emotions. As you communicate persuasively, make your audience feel something about even the most data-intensive proposal.

To persuade your audience with pathos, analyze how they will identify with the emotion. Use simple language, an emotional tone of voice, emotionally charged visual aids, and stories.

Establish an emotional connection with your audience, but do not use pathos alone. Audiences do not want to be manipulated, so they quickly pick up on inauthentic emotional appeals. As you seek to humanize yourself and your message, remember to include plenty of ethos and logos with your pathos.

Ethos

Although audiences generally decide based on pathos, the persuasion becomes stronger with ethos, which uses trustworthy information to persuade. To persuade with credibility, you could use influencers, your personal subject-matter expertise, or external-source credibility.

If you are a subject-matter expert, cite and rely on your resume credibility but add support from other credible experts, citing exactly who they are and why they are also experts. Avoid the misleading fallacious appeal to anonymous authority—phrases like 'studies say,' 'experts say,' or 'research shows' hide the source.

Using and citing credible sources strengthens both the message and your credibility as a communicator.

Logos

Logos persuades with logic, reasoning, and evidence.

However, learn how to avoid misapplying logos—committing logical fallacies.

These fallacies appear everywhere: in the business press, in the speeches of world leaders, and in lunchroom conversations. Unless you inoculate your messages from such faulty thinking, you risk losing credibility with well-educated audiences.

The Adidas campaign below is a great example of how to combine pathos, ethos, and logos to persuade your audience.

If you want to learn more about persuasion, skim Professor Robert Cialdini's book Pre-Suasion. Supported by decades of careful psychological experiments, Cialdini’s conclusions are summarized in these seven keys to persuasion. As you read about each pillar, consider that it has a counterfeit, a downside. Avoid counterfeits so your audiences do not feel manipulated.

SEVEN PILLARS OF PERSUASION (click here)

Commitment

People will be more inclined to do something if they pre-commit to it. Streaming platforms like Netflix, Spotify, and Disney+ are prime examples of commitment. Subscribers pay a monthly fee to access a vast content library.

Commitment is reinforced by convenience and personalization: users can create personalized profiles, curate playlists or watch lists, and receive tailored recommendations based on viewing or listening habits. This level of customization and convenience fosters a sense of investment and commitment among subscribers.

Predispose your audience to accept your call to action simply by asking them to commit to something: attending a presentation or reviewing your resume, for example.

Any powerful tool can have a downside, however. In your own decision-making, guard against an escalation of commitment or commitment bias, a fallacy manifested by a continued investment of time, energy, and money in failing projects (i.e., throwing good money after bad).

Reciprocity

This pillar is like a quid pro quo: give something to get something. It is often referred to as “the favor bank.” Human beings tend to keep a mental ledger of who owes them what. If you deposit favors into the bank, you’re more likely to withdraw the cooperation you need.

For instance, a brand might host a giveaway on social media platforms where followers are required to like and share the post and tag friends in the comments to enter the contest. By doing so, the brand is leveraging the principle of reciprocity, providing a chance to win a desirable prize. Doing so creates a sense of obligation or gratitude among participants. Followers feel more inclined to engage with the brand's content and share it with their network to reciprocate the brand's generosity.

The potential downside here is an appeal to guilt—attempting to make someone feel guilty for not reciprocating. What distinguishes persuasion from manipulation is that the audience benefits from the call to action.

Social Proof

Everyone wants to fit in, so people generally do what they perceive their peers to be doing. In a famous experiment, Cialdini and his research team tried different techniques to convince hotel guests to reuse their towels. Of all the strategies, telling a hotel guest that most guests in the same hotel reuse their towels was the most successful. 

Platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and Twitter prominently display trending topics, hashtags, or videos that are generating high engagement and views. These trends often include dance challenges, comedic skits, or popular challenges that users participate in and share with their followers. The sheer number of likes, comments, and shares serves as social proof that the content is captivating and worth sharing.

Beware, however, the lemming effect—going along to get along. Social proof, when not harnessed to an audience-enhancing end, is mere peer pressure.

Authority

This pillar closely aligns with Aristotle’s ethos. A person whose authority your audience trusts is the most persuasive advocate for a course of action. Celebrity, medical, and academic endorsements use this technique.

A relatable appeal to authority involves influencers or experts endorsing or recommending products, brands, or causes. Whether it's beauty influencers, gaming influencers, or celebrities, influencers’ authority and expertise hold significant sway over preferences and purchasing decisions.

On the flip side, avoid appeals to anonymous authority: phrases like experts say or research proves are fake attempts to sound authoritative.

Liking

Similar to social proof and authority, liking relies on the relationship between the audience and the influencer. Some charities leverage this tactic at a neighborhood level: they find a sympathetic donor and then ask that person to send personalized donation requests to her closest friends and neighbors. The result? A 56% response rate, compared to about 30% from impersonal requests.

The liking strategy does not lend itself to quick, in-the-moment application. If you want to secure a raise, build a relationship with your manager: go to lunch together, regularly offer sincere compliments, help them, and get to know them. Then when you ask for a raise, your boss will be influenced by their positive feelings toward you.

The caution with this strategy is that we are wired to like people who are similar to us. This tendency, which social scientists call homophily, can easily—even unintentionally—become tribalism, discrimination, or xenophobia.

Scarcity

Marketers use this tactic all the time: Last chance! Limited-time offer! Act now to receive your order by tomorrow! Scarcity is one of the most heavily researched and best-documented persuasive tactics in applied psychology.

For instance, a popular sneaker brand like Nike or Adidas may release a limited-edition shoe with unique designs, colors, or materials. These sneakers are typically produced in limited quantities and are highly sought after by sneaker enthusiasts and collectors. The scarcity of these limited editions creates a sense of urgency and exclusivity, driving consumers to compete to own a rare, coveted item.

If a genuine element of scarcity is part of your pitch, pointing it out to your audience will bolster your call to action.

Be careful, however. If the scarcity is exaggerated or contrived, the audience will react with derision, and you’ll lose their trust.

The psychology of scarcity is closely related to FOMO—fear of missing out. This anxiety is usually an irrational fear that convinces our subconscious that we don’t have enough or that we aren’t enough. Because they are destructive, avoid persuasive pitches based on FOMO.

Unity

Unity is about connecting an identity you share with your audience. The more you can create the feeling that you’re family—or at least, that you’re all in this together—the more persuasive you’ll be.

To make unifying connections with your audience, prime them to think about what you have in common.

Generation Z tends to be socially conscious, valuing brands that align with their beliefs and support important causes. Companies that actively support and promote social or environmental causes can prime potential customers to develop positive associations with a brand. By highlighting their commitment to making a positive impact, these brands appeal to Gen Z's values and increase the likelihood of their support.

Recommend

In 2019, betting on the future of artificial intelligence (AI) and the role it would play in shaping the future of technology, Microsoft started investing heavily in OpenAI, a non-profit AI research organization and tech company founded in 2015 to develop and promote friendly AI for the benefit of humanity. In November of 2022, OpenAI released ChatGPT, which quickly went viral. A deluge of posts from Twitter to LinkedIn showed ChatGPT’s amazing abilities to write everything from a travel plan to fables to computer coding programs. Within five days, ChatGPT had over 1 million users.

By comparison, Facebook and Instagram, two of the largest global platforms, took several months to reach the 1 million-user mark.

In 2019, Microsoft’s $1 billion investment in OpenAI made no headlines. However, on January 23, 2023, Microsoft announced the third phase of its partnership with OpenAI by making a multi-year, multibillion-dollar investment to “accelerate AI breakthroughs to ensure…benefits are broadly shared with the world.” Although some naysayers worried about the uncertainty of Microsoft’s investment, on the date of the announcement, Microsoft stock was trading at $245.18 per share. On July 6, 2023, Microsoft stock closed at $359.49 per share, a 46.6% increase in just six months!

How did Microsoft’s board make this decision? On gut feelings? Did Satya Nadalla, Microsoft’s CEO, decide alone? The short answer is NO.

In December of 2018, President of Microsoft Research Peter Lee was briefing Nadalla and the Microsoft board about a series of tests Microsoft had conducted on GPT-4, the then-unreleased OpenAI large language model. Lee and the researchers were astounded by the model’s ability to understand conversational language and generate human-like answers. Lee and his team believed GPT-4 showed signs of artificial general intelligence on par with those of a human mind.

Stunned that OpenAI, with only 250 employees, had surpassed an AI project Microsoft had been working on for decades, Nadalla and the board were intrigued, but they had to see the data.

Should Microsoft—a company known for purchasing other companies—purchase OpenAI, invest in OpenAI, partner with OpenAI, or do nothing? Companies cannot make billion-dollar decisions without understanding the options and how they relate to weighted criteria.

Companies like Microsoft use sophisticated decision-making tools, but the principles remain constant—base decisions on logical criteria, neutral information, and a solid recommendation, not on your gut.

A recommendation—like investing in OpenAI—evaluates options based on weighted criteria to identify the best option for an organization. Unlike persuasion, recommendations are generally solicited, so use this strategy when you are asked to compare alternatives and recommend the best course of action.

Among useful decision models that help business professionals evaluate business problems/situations and recommend the best solution are the Pugh decision matrix, the Harvard Business School PACADI case analysis decision model, and Eugene Bardach's Eightfold Path to Policy Analysis Decision Making. Although each has a nuanced methodology, all models are designed to help professionals make well-informed, objective decisions.

The models share these common steps:

Step 1. Identify the Business Problem

Step 2. Identify Alternatives

Identify alternative options that could solve the business problem. Brainstorm with colleagues and peers and consult credible sources to identify realistic alternatives. Score the alternatives on a scale, e.g., 1 – 5 with 1 being the worst and 5 being the best.

Step 3. Identify and Weight Criteria

Identify and clearly define the criteria by which you will evaluate the possible alternatives. Weight these criteria in order of importance. These criteria should reflect the values and needs of your audience/key stakeholders, not yours. The validity and robustness of the matrix depend on the set of criteria/requirements, so think carefully about them.

Step 4. Create a Table and Analyze the Data

Create a table that lists options in columns and weighted criteria in rows. Try to avoid a binary (only two options) choice. Multiply the scores by the weights of each criterion. Add the weighted scores to get an overall score. The highest-ranked score is the obvious “winner.”

Step 5. Evaluate the Winner

Evaluate the winner; perhaps hybrids might exist. You might consider combining the best parts of different options.

Step 6. Make and Support the Decision

Make the decision and write reasons—supported by your matrix and by secondary research—that support the winning choice. This matrix might not produce a clear winner, but it will probably produce a clear losing strategy you want to avoid. You could remove the losing choice and rerun your model.

Supporting the decision includes considering an implementation timeline, tradeoffs, and obstacles. Although you can never anticipate all possible risks, anticipate and identify how to mitigate risk.

You may never have to recommend a billion-dollar deal, but the same logic applies on a smaller scale. Imagine you are deciding on the right car to purchase. You identified three options: a Subaru, a Honda, and a Jeep.

The correct choice depends on the criteria you identify and how heavily you weigh them. Score each option against each criterion and multiply the score by the criterion's assigned weight.

Here is a simple example of a decision matrix you could use:

Based on alternative scoring and criteria weighting, the Subaru Crosstrek is the best choice for this model and scenario.

The decision process for large companies like Microsoft or large nonprofits like the IMF is more complex and sophisticated, but the principles remain the same—the recommendation is based on alternative options evaluated against weighted criteria.

The next time you are asked to recommend a course of action, you will be equipped with tools to objectively—not emotionally—recommend a solution to a complex business problem. Review the Pugh Matrix, the PACADI model, and The Eightfold Path to More Effective Problem Solving to determine which model is best for your situation.

In Conclusion

In summary, this chapter on information, persuasion, and recommendation explored the vital roles each of these concepts plays in effective business communication. Information serves to shed light on facts, data, and updates, fostering transparency, clarity, and alignment within organizations. By applying ethos, pathos, and logos to your delivery, you convince your audience to adopt your ideas and approve your projects. Finally, you build trust and credibility by delivering solid, objective recommendations that empower colleagues, subordinates, and superiors to succeed in their tasks.

Your audience will remember the information, make better decisions, and appreciate your expertise.

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